


Metal On The Brain

by Abitscrewy



Category: Soul Eater
Genre: Drabble, Headcanon, One-off, Short Story, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-03
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-29 01:28:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7664992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abitscrewy/pseuds/Abitscrewy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I should have written this a long time ago.<br/>This is how Stein got the screw.<br/>From his point of view.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Metal On The Brain

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DollyPop](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DollyPop/gifts).



> DO NOT READ THIS IF YOU HAVE A PHOBIA OF BLOOD, VOMITING, SELF HARM, HARMFUL THOUGHTS, EXTREME GUILT, SCHIZOPHRENIA, OR MENTAL ILLNESS.

I don’t remember half of the fight. I should have been more careful. I should have thought about my surroundings. I should have factored in that it had rained not an hour before. The Kishin was large and unsightly as all of them are. Nearly pure evil. The thing was on a rampage and people were dying. Not that I cared at the time. I wanted it dead. I’d had a fight with Spirit’s lover, soon to be wife earlier. She said she’d catch me red handed or something. I was angry, my grip on Marie’s hilt was stronger than usual. She asked me if I needed to calm down but I pushed her and my emotions aside and went into the fray.

It was about as tall as a two-story building.   
It was slow, my advantage.  
It had rained, both at a disadvantage.  
I was angry, its advantage.  
It had eaten so many souls, it was going bezerk. When it finally noticed me it was almost too late for it. Somehow my reflexes, timing.. Something was off. My brain was a blur and it caught me off guard. It slammed the back of its hand into me, which was pretty much my size at the time. I flew into a building, through a glass window and onto the ground.  
I scowled and got up. I could just barely hear Marie’s voice over the others. People screaming, in my head and out. She could tell something was wrong with me. The last thing I remember is her saying my name.  
“Franken--”  
I think she said more, but it was far too late. I was furious, I _needed_ bloodshed. Desperately. All I remember during the fight is pain, images, and not even fighting against whatever it was that took control. Whomever...

I snapped out of it because Marie took a risk. She came out of weapon form and activated her wavelength to try and get me out of a frenzy. It worked. We were in another building, taking cover. The thing was reaching through a hole in the wall, trying to reach at her. I shouted at her to get back in weapon form. Something was wrong, something was about to happen. I could feel it.  
I fucking begged her but she wouldn’t. She wanted to make sure I was okay.  
That’s when something awful happened.  
The damn Kishin grabbed her.

It caught hold of her hair, pulling her towards the hole in the wall. I took her hand, but its claws were already around her head. Daintily, as if taunting me, bartering her life for its own. I screamed.. Something. Probably at the voices in my own head to shut up. I couldn’t feel, I can’t remember feeling at least.  
Its grip on her tightened and one of its giant claws dug into her eye.

I remember her scream. Sometimes I hear it on a bad day. I have to scratch it out anymore. I can’t let people hear me when I tell voices to go away. It makes it painfully obvious that things still bother me...  
Her scream...  
She let go of me, instincts to grab the claws kicking in. She cut her hands just trying to pry the thing from her eye socket. I fell, since she’d been holding me up. By now the thing was holding her outside the building. I ran and jumped at it, landing on its shoulder. I shot my wavelength into it, and miscalculated. That shock nearly took me out too. I put too much into it, I couldn’t breathe. By the time I’d gotten some semblance of oxygen, the thing grabbed my head as well. I thought we’d both be dead, but Marie was still conscious.  
I’d call it a miracle if I weren’t agnostic.

The thing was stupid enough to put us in the same hand. She transformed and I shot it with my wavelength. This time Marie was there to amplify it and help me not pass out while doing it.  
This gave us time. It dropped us and I swung Marie through its fucking head.  
We both passed out before she could eat the soul.

I woke up in a hospital of course, in the same room as Marie. Apparently she’d asked for me, wanted to know if I was alright. I evidently asked as well, so they put us together. We spent a long time recovering.  
For the first time in my life I regretted my decisions. I felt guilty for what I’d said, how I yelled at her.  
I felt guilty for even perusing the thing. I’d never felt guilty in my life. I didn’t understand at all, why I felt guilt and regret and most of all sadness. Whenever I saw the bandages over her eye, something in my stomach churned. Gave the voices some new material, too.

We spent so much time in that hospital together. She eventually... Sort of.. Forgave me. In her own way. I wouldn’t have minded if she hadn’t forgiven me, I still feel I didn’t deserve it. Yet she did. We came closer, we became closer friends than I’d been with Spirit. Spirit was always somewhat intimidated by me, even if he wouldn’t show it. He resented me.  
Marie wasn’t afraid of me, and I liked that. I felt a certain attraction to it, now that I understand that that’s what I’d felt. She didn’t fear me, she could kick my ass if she really wanted. I really liked that.

She made me laugh, made me smile. I came to enjoy being around her to an extreme. I’d get anxious when she’d go in for a check-up, or to change bandages, or anything like that. I felt my heart get faster when she wasn’t around. Something could go wrong. She could be attacked. The doctors could...  
I hate doctors.  
Nothing happened of course. She came back fine every time, I’d deny that I was worried. I’d push those emotions away even if they were still there. I put myself in denial. I became addicted to her presence.

I started taking missions a little more seriously. I started defending her more than myself. Nearly cost me my left arm. I didn’t care. As long as she was safe.

* * *

 

She became a Death Scythe. I was so proud, and happy to see her happy. I didn’t know what I wanted to do afterwards at all, but it didn’t matter in that moment. She was smiling. I may have smirked.  
Then I got news that she was to be stationed around the fucking world. I had this awful feeling in my gut, but hiding emotions on my face is my forte. I said it was fine. I encouraged her to go, even, if she wanted. I’d just.. stay here in the laboratory I’d found. I’d been fixing it up at the time.

Over the years I pushed away my emotions. I’d get sudden pangs of anxiety. My heart rate would go through the roof. I sort of gave myself a heart condition without meaning to. My withdrawal was awful, or it would have been if I hadn’t pushed the emotions aside. When I started questioning why I felt entitled to her presence, why I was so worried about her, I knew I had to stop thinking about it. I had to stop thinking about her. She’d call me, send me emails. Eventually I stopped replying. I came to hate the sound of the phone ringing.

I became a hermit. Doing autopsies for Lord Death, distracting myself by learning new languages. Learning new things. I finished medical school from home. It was easy for me. I never really had to show up. I aced every test they threw at me. It was a good distraction but it didn’t last.  
Five years after she left, I snapped.

Suddenly I felt awful. I felt sick to my stomach, I started pacing. My left arm started twitching without my controlling it. My breathing picked up and my heart started to hurt. I finally collapsed somewhere muttering to myself.

“Why? Why did she leave? Why did I tell her to leave?! Why do I feel like I need her?? I don’t need her! I didn’t need her before! Not like this, I didn’t...” I didn’t know what the hell was going on. Even my vision became blurred and distorted. Things around me started to twist. I felt like someone was sitting on my chest. I was pulling at my hair, and crying.  
I hadn’t cried since I was a child.  
Something was wrong.  
I grabbed as many mirrors as I could find and put them all in one room. I stared at myself, stripped down to my boxers.   
What was wrong? Nothing physically.  
 _It’s all in your head. **It’s all in your head.** Nothing’s wrong. Nothing could possibly..._

Then I snapped. I grabbed my head, started screaming.. I don’t even remember specific words. It all revolved around her. Thoughts of wishing her dead whizzed around in my mind until I came to resent myself. I couldn’t imagine her dead and bleeding without guilt and pain. Every time an image was in my head of her cut open.. Just like any of my other fantasies of this sort. It was different. It hurt me more. My heart continued to pound, I shook my head. I hit myself until bruises and lacerations were fresh on my skin. I’d scream at myself in my mind. Why couldn’t I stand to see her hurt?

I fell to my hands and knees and vomited, though I’d hardly eaten anything anyway. It was just bile.. I couldn’t breathe, I could hardly see anything but my beaten body. All I could think was _Serves me right._

I grabbed the proper tools. I grabbed anything that might help. I’d been welding random bits of metal as another one of my distractions. One among them was a large version of a screw, but with all of it being smooth. Never thought I’d screw it into anything so I didn’t give it the parts. It was for show until now.

It was the perfect size.  
I needed these emotions gone. I needed to feel more pain than I had ever felt. I started ripping apart the stitches on my head from that night. That night where everything changed, where I made a stupid decision or fifty. It lead me here. I hated that night so much.  
I took it out on myself. I was laughing and crying and tearing at my flesh. I was shaking but I kept going anyway. I knew what parts of the brain needed to go, what to trim and what to do to do so. I knew how to get the metal around, how not to kill myself in the process. It was all rather scientific for an emotional kid tearing apart his skull.

The bone saw I had was too big, so I spent hours just carving layer by layer through my skull with a fucking scalpel. I couldn’t scream. I’d forced myself not to. I couldn’t until the deed was done. Then I could scream all I wanted.  
I managed to keep myself alive with my wavelength and a bunch of equipment. It’s amazing I remember as much as I do.  
Once I’d finally made the holes in my skull, I started to trim what was needed to fit the thing in without much resistance. It still resisted, but I managed to work it around and through. I managed to put some bits of replacement metal around the holes so that it wouldn’t have any wiggle room and fall out before I could heal. I welded the damn stuff to my skull and neglected my rule about screaming for a while. Unfortunately some of the metal was oddly cut, and the screw would sometimes turn when touched. It hurt like hell, and made an awful noise.

I wasn’t bleeding anymore, and took some time to pump some new blood into my system. I blacked out for a while, probably just screamed and cried and muttered.  
When my memory returns, I was on the ground. I was still crying. I saw myself in the mirror, the creature I’d become. It wasn’t even a hallucination. I was in pain, but not enough. The screw hadn’t quite kicked in. I wasn’t out of the woods yet. My chest was somewhat bear back then, with just one scar across my upper chest.  
I decided to remedy this by slicing into my abdomen.  
I needed more pain. I needed punishment for my emotions. I wasn’t allowed emotions. It was tearing me inside-out.. Or was that just me.

I tore around inside my abdomen for quite some time, ripping out bits that could potentially need replacing later. I replaced what I wanted and welded some metal onto my bones. Make them a little sturdier. Wouldn’t want to be in a situation where my body was as fragile as my mind. Not anymore. I wouldn’t be vulnerable anymore. Fuck being vulnerable. Fuck emotions. I **needed** stability, I _**needed** control_. I was desperate for it. Desperate enough to cut myself open en mass.

I was finally satisfied, stitching myself up and chuckling the whole time. All I felt was pain and peace. I’d gotten some of what I felt I deserved. I did deserve it. I wanted that pain. I’m not a masochist. I just wanted to pay for what I’d done.

_I deserved it I deserved i **t I deserved it...**_

I sat there for a while, against one of the mirrors. That room is still in the lab, with all those mirrors. So I can walk in there and break down. Some of them have been broken, some are still intact. Sometimes I look into them and panic. They seem to trigger memories and hallucinations pertaining to said memories.

I crawled my way to a bathroom with a larger tub and filled it with lukewarm water. It stung like hell, but maybe I deserved that too. A cherry on top. I washed myself of the blood, or tried to, and hobbled back to my room after vomiting again. I slept for around three days, and woke up famished.

I managed to eat something and drink some water, and I found that.. I didn’t feel my emotions as strongly as before. They were muted, numbed, muffled. Like I wasn’t wearing my glasses. Though, when I accidentally turned the screw, some emotions became clearer. Mainly curiosity, confusion, and just a little bit of pride.  
I experimented with the screw for a while, though after lubricating it and fixing some of the metal plating it stopped screeching.. Started clicking instead, and I didn’t mind that as much. A noise to focus on instead of voices I supposed.  
Speaking of which, they were somewhat muted as well. The voices. I liked that.

Things started getting normal again.

Then I became a teacher..

Then Asura was awoken....  
But that’s another story.

 

{Doctor,} Prof. Franken V. Stein.


End file.
